Robert Gates, the former Defense Department secretary who famously navigated his public-service career among eight ideologically diverse presidents, cannot dismiss the linkage.

“To get anything done in Washington, you have to reach across the aisle,” said Gates as he prepared for the Ringling College Library Association Town Hall Lecture Series at Sarasota's Van Wezel Auditorium on Feb. 5.

“One of the reasons we won the Cold War was because we were able to sustain a basic strategy of containment through nine presidential administrations of both political parties.”

But that sort of bipartisan resolve has collapsed as surely as the Berlin Wall. And Gates — former CIA director, National Security Council adviser — has watched redistricting exact a toll on domestic and foreign policy.

“It took us a long time to get to where we are,” said Gates, who was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama upon leaving his five-year hitch as the Pentagon boss in 2011. “Even if you changed every member of Congress overnight, it wouldn't make any difference, because the polarization is structural, because of gerrymandering.

“Of the 435 members of Congress, perhaps 50 of those nationally are actually contested. The real elections are in the primaries,” Gates said. “That's where the political bases are the most committed and ideological, on both the left and the right.

“That leaves 60 to 70 percent of those in the middle with very little voice in that selection process. That's just one example of something that has to change, and you can't reverse it overnight.”

In fact, in between his duties as chancellor of William & Mary College, Gates, 69, is completing a book he hopes will offer a way forward. Following publication this year of a memoir of his tenure as Defense Secretary, Gates will release a book in 2014 about “changing public institutions.”

Deputy CIA director under President Reagan during the Iran-Contra scandal, appointed to run the Defense Department by President George W. Bush, the Air Force veteran is the only secretary of defense in history to be retained by a newly elected president. Party politics failed to alter his performance inside the Beltway.

“I think you'd be hard-pressed to find an example of the secretary of state and the defense secretary working more closely together than I did with Hillary Clinton,” Gates said. “Unless it was with Condoleezza Rice when she was secretary of state.”

But Gates, who plans to give his Sarasota audience an update on “a variety of trouble spots around the world that tend to be neglected in lieu of domestic policy,” sounds relieved to finished with the posturing on Capitol Hill. He says he declined to watch the recent two-day Senate grilling of Clinton.

“I have no desire to ever watch congressional hearings on TV,” he said. “I've sat through enough of those.”

<p><em>SARASOTA</em> - Could political gerrymandering threaten national security?</p><p>Robert Gates, the former Defense Department secretary who famously navigated his public-service career among eight ideologically diverse presidents, cannot dismiss the linkage.</p><p>“To get anything done in Washington, you have to reach across the aisle,” said Gates as he prepared for the Ringling College Library Association Town Hall Lecture Series at Sarasota's Van Wezel Auditorium on Feb. 5.</p><p>“One of the reasons we won the Cold War was because we were able to sustain a basic strategy of containment through nine presidential administrations of both political parties.”</p><p>But that sort of bipartisan resolve has collapsed as surely as the Berlin Wall. And Gates — former CIA director, National Security Council adviser — has watched redistricting exact a toll on domestic and foreign policy.</p><p>“It took us a long time to get to where we are,” said Gates, who was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama upon leaving his five-year hitch as the Pentagon boss in 2011. “Even if you changed every member of Congress overnight, it wouldn't make any difference, because the polarization is structural, because of gerrymandering.</p><p>“Of the 435 members of Congress, perhaps 50 of those nationally are actually contested. The real elections are in the primaries,” Gates said. “That's where the political bases are the most committed and ideological, on both the left and the right.</p><p>“That leaves 60 to 70 percent of those in the middle with very little voice in that selection process. That's just one example of something that has to change, and you can't reverse it overnight.”</p><p>In fact, in between his duties as chancellor of William & Mary College, Gates, 69, is completing a book he hopes will offer a way forward. Following publication this year of a memoir of his tenure as Defense Secretary, Gates will release a book in 2014 about “changing public institutions.”</p><p>Deputy CIA director under President Reagan during the Iran-Contra scandal, appointed to run the Defense Department by President George W. Bush, the Air Force veteran is the only secretary of defense in history to be retained by a newly elected president. Party politics failed to alter his performance inside the Beltway.</p><p>“I think you'd be hard-pressed to find an example of the secretary of state and the defense secretary working more closely together than I did with Hillary Clinton,” Gates said. “Unless it was with Condoleezza Rice when she was secretary of state.”</p><p>But Gates, who plans to give his Sarasota audience an update on “a variety of trouble spots around the world that tend to be neglected in lieu of domestic policy,” sounds relieved to finished with the posturing on Capitol Hill. He says he declined to watch the recent two-day Senate grilling of Clinton.</p><p>“I have no desire to ever watch congressional hearings on TV,” he said. “I've sat through enough of those.”</p>